Soleil Royal by EricWiberg - Heller - 1/100 - started 45 years ago

[dafi]

The question I am having is: Did in Soleil´s days those ports were pointing foreward or aft as seen in Vasa?

... and the 2 last ports each deck are pointing aft.

Nicely to be seen in the small reconstruction of the upper gundeck. Those guns can hardly be pointed the conventional way with 90° to the ship´s center line

Also on "head chasers" on the upper deck are pointing forewards.

... thus avoiding the cathead-knee 🙂

Something that went wrong on the 1:10 model, where these guns have to be placed over the cathead-knees 😉

By the way, the lower deck guns have the same errata.

XXXDAn

Edited February 4 by dafi

[EricWiberg]

Great pictures Dafi! Does the Vasa have a more obvious bluff bow than Soleil Royal that would alow the gun to point forward while still being set further away from the centerline of tbe ship? Also, is that one hawse hole per side instead of two as Soleil Royal has?

[Snug Harbor Johnny]

  The two 'forward pointing' guns served as "bow chasers", and had to have a longer barrel due to the angle of the ship in that area.  The gun carriage was therefore at an angle - just imagine the geometry, and there was a post elsewhere on MSW (try and find it, but it was Vasa related) on this very subject.  My theory is that ships in the early era like the Golden Hind had two forward pointing guns in the hull because 1.) there was little room on the typical small forecastles in those days (the Vasa being an exception, and likely the builders omitted a forecastle as they found the hull 'tippy' after it was too late in the build to do anything about it ... ), and 2.) the bowsprits had a higher angle and carried a horizontal yard with sail.  the high angle being to keep the sail out of the water - but then would be in the way of fire from any forward pointing gun on the forecastle.

 

  These ships were 'machines', and form follows function - function dictated by the technology and evolution of ships at the time.  The reason bowsprits on so many examples of period ship artwork (e.g. Drakes 'Caribbean' fleet) are angled high is for the canvas on the yard there to be effective as a sail to balance wind pressure in conjunction with the stern lateen sail (there were no jib sails at that time, and soon the spritsail topmast evolved - something else in the way of forward firing ordnance atop the forecastle).  This leaves a clear space for a forward firing canon from the hull at the bow on either side, to cover the 'blind spot' (preventing a vulnerability).  There were always two cannon pointed directly astern, where there is a convenient perpendicular wall, that covers a vulnerability in that direction.

 

  The Golden Hind's armaments are described in two separate testimonies from Nuno de Silva ( Portuguese  Navigator held by Drake while circling S. America - to be set ashore on the West coast of Mexico) affirming the armaments to be 7 per side (broadside) and 4 at the bows - meaning 2 astern and 2 forward.   So my bet is that there were 2 'forward' facing (or nearly so), just as seen on the Vasa, 2 astern (typical) and a broadside on the gun deck below the weather deck of either 7 guns per side, or 5 guns plus 2 more (per side, of lesser weight) on the quarter deck - as seen on some aertwork and drawings of French 'race-built' galleons.

[popeye2sea]

Also to be considered: Before line of battle tactics started to be employed in the 1600's, ships tended to be fought by firing cannons as you closed with the enemy prior to turning to running broadside to.  The cannons  near the bow were often pointed as far forward as their gunports allowed.  The guns were fired as they came to bear on the enemy.  The same was true for the guns near the stern except they were angled aft as much as possible.  Cannons were often slower loading back then.  So the ship would basically charge in fire each cannon as the ship bore around and then retreat to reload.

 

Regards,

Henry

[EricWiberg]

Johnny and Henry - thank you for the comments, as I find any and all to be helpful.

 

I reread Dafi's post, and I wonder if I missed what he was asking... ? Dafi's first picture shows the Vasa chase gunport pointing almost straight ahead. In other words, if the ship were on a compass and pointed straight north, the Vasa chase gun port is also pointing straight north (I think this is due to the rather bluff bow?). Note the spacing between top and bottom gun ports appears very consistent all the way up to the chase gun port.

 

Now, if you look at the chase gun port that I put in on the Soleil Royal, the spacing between top and bottom gun ports is also very consistent... and yet the SR chase gun port is basically facing much more to the east. Now, I wonder if Dafi is asking if the SR chase gun port should be pushed over to the centerline as far as possible, so the chase gun port would be facing much more to the north, i.e. to a potential target ahead of the Soleil Royal. I might be misinterpreting his question though. but if I really wanted to have the SR chase port facing north as much as possible, I would have to fill in the hawse holes, locate the gun port there, and locate the hawse holes further aft a bit?

Edited February 5 by EricWiberg

[Hubac's Historian]

Eric, you have essentially placed your forward chase port in exactly the same place where I scribed mine.  Looking back on it, I probably could have gotten away with scribing that port about an 1/8” closer toward the stem.  If I had done so, though, the forward edge of that port would just about touch up to the knees of the head:

The difference would not have made any definitive statement about the trajectory of the chase guns.  It is useful to keep in mind, here, that the shape of the Heller hull, along the lower main deck, is not really reflective of the reality of French hull design at this time.

 

Consider the following drawing from 1679, likely from the hand of Laurent’s son Etienne Hubac, representing his idealized lines for a first-rate ship:

Note the significantly more bluff bow, the more forward-facing chase ports, and how straight and slab-sided the hull is for most of it’s line of greatest breadth.

 

The drawing is likely not 100% representative of its time, but it is markedly different than the gentle and continuous curve of the Heller hull.

 

In other words, even if you widen your hull at the stem, as I did, you still aren’t going to achieve the kind of chase port position that you see, here, on La Reyne:

In my opinion, the effort at representation is 9/10ths the battle, because the kit architecture precludes absolutely correct placement of the detail.

[Hubac's Historian]

For the sake of clarification, Etienne makes a series of 16 faint hash marks locating the ports on the starboard side of the drawing.  Given the date of the drawing, I have always taken this as reasonably credible evidence that SR1 (1670) was originally pierced for 16 ports.  After all, if the Hubac’s had decided, after La Reyne (1668) that a first-rate could not reasonably be pierced for 16, then why would they still be proposing it in 1679?

[EricWiberg]

OK... much happier with the anchor linings now than on my first attempt on the old hull (just have to finish scribing the plank lines and give it a wash).

 

 

At first, I hung an anchor up and just penciled in the swing lines on the hull. Wasn't satisfied with how that looked, so I put the port side on a scanner and scanned the bow; I drew in some lines and got a a sweep that I was satisfied with. I printed that out and then cut out a paper anchor lining, which I then put on 1mm thick sheet styrene and traced two identical anchor linings and cut them out with scissors. My first attempt I added individual planks to make up the anchor linings; doing it this way and scribing in the plank lines was much easier and faster. I also sanded the plank edges if needed to make them flush with the wales.

Edited February 5 by EricWiberg

[Hubac's Historian]

Yes, this is a major improvement over your first attempt.  Time well-spent!

[Snug Harbor Johnny]

   The well-known 1586 drawing of a race-built English galleon came to mind, and indeed - there are 7 guns for a broadside ... and (yes!) a forward pointing gunport.  Due to the rising curve in the stern of the main gun deck, there is an aft communication port closer to the waterline, similar to the one Vasa has.  The drawing 'rotates' the stern elevation by 45 degrees so the viewer can see that there are 2 stern guns.

  

  French built examples employed a step-down  of the gun deck where the quarter deck begins aft of the main mast - which keeps the line of guns more level (instead of having an increasing  side angle) and easier to man.  The headroom in the quarters above was thus increased.  This is a plausible configuration of the Golden Hind ... hiding in plain sight, as de Silva noted she was French built but not new (nor that old, as she was able to make it around the world).

 

[EricWiberg]

On to drilling gun port lid "anchor" holes and making fenders. So I needed to drill two holes above every gun port (that was to have an open lid) with a 0.016" bit... these holes would accept two lengths of 28 gauge wire anchored into the gun port lids. The first go-around with the old hull I used a pin vise. This time I purchased a Yakamoz variable speed drill... and was absolutely amazed at how much easier and faster it was to precisely drill holes. All without wobbling the prior pin vise just enough to snap a bit!

 

My first attempt at fenders had been made with 2mm wide x 2.5mm proud Evergreen sticks. Way too thick. This time I simply laminated two 2mm wide x 0.75mm thick pieces together, then simply cut 2mm wide pieces as needed to fit in between the wales. Sometimes the wales were very proud and I used 1mm thick pieces.. some wales were barely proud and needed only 0.5mm thick pieces. I also beveled the ends of the pieces so that they matched the bevel of the wale on either end. Then one piece at a time, I put on a tiny drop of glue and pressed the fender down onto the hull, and it would pick up the piece that was between the wales. A bit of Tamiya Extra Thin was then added and it effectively welded the two pieces together. It takes me about 15 minutes per fender. After drying I will need to do a minor amount of sanding to smooth away any gaps (a few light passes with 60 grit sandpaper adds wood grain mark and wipes away any gaps between pieces). I almost went out to buy a caliper, but this seems to work very well for me.

 

Finally, you can see how much thinner the fenders will be compared to my first attempt (the "new" fender in the foreground obviously is not pressed into the old hull, so it isn't seated flush)

 

[Hubac's Historian]

Again, a big improvement in scale, Eric.  I’ll get back to you a little later this evening on the lanyard holes.

[EricWiberg]

Thank you Marc! FYI - I saw a Royal Louis drawing today, where the aftmost lower deck gun port lanyard holes started right above the gun port and just below the wale. As the gun ports proceed forward and the wale dips down closer to the gun ports... the lanyard hole jumped up above the wale, but not through the wale.

[Hubac's Historian]

Hi Eric,

 

The St. Philippe monograph shows an equidistant transition that crosses the wale and pierces it around mid-ships:

The L’Ambiteaux monograph essentially shows the same thing.  A cross-section, where the lanyard passes through the wale:

In the broadside, the lanyards themselves are omitted, but the holes are present:

Sorry for the poor photo quality.

Edited February 8 by Hubac's Historian

[EricWiberg]

Thank you Marc! This is great info, and it does appear going through the wales is an accurate representation. 

[Hubac's Historian]

Boudriot and Lemineur are the period authorities on the matter, so I would trust that they have read the fine print on these small details.

[baskerbosse]

On 2/4/2024 at 9:38 PM, dafi said:

The question I am having is: Did in Soleil´s days those ports were pointing foreward or aft as seen in Vasa?

... and the 2 last ports each deck are pointing aft.

Nicely to be seen in the small reconstruction of the upper gundeck. Those guns can hardly be pointed the conventional way with 90° to the ship´s center line

XXXDAn

Hi Dan,

Yes your observation is correct, Vasa's guns are not 90 degrees to the centreline, they are pointing in a fan pattern, roughly 90 degrees to the hull side.
As this was before the days of line battle.

Great looking Soleil Royal.

Cheers!
Peter

[EricWiberg]

Very good start to the day... affixing the fenders to the hull, and starting to bolt up the scarf joints. I found some 0.03" round head plastic "rivets" online. I make a dot with a marker, then drill a hole at each dot. Pick up a rivet and dab the end in glue, then just push the rivet in. It does work best to drill each rivet hole all of the way through the hull; I tried cutting the rivet stem to 1-2mm, but there simply isn't enough room when I grab the rivet head with tweezers. Leaving the stem at 4mm makes it so much easier. The only bad news is that 10-20% of my rivets pop out of the tweezers and fly off into the universe. 

[Hubac's Historian]

Skids look awesome, Eric!  That’s a whole lotta’ drilling, but it will be worth the effort in the end.

[EricWiberg]

Thank you, Marc! I can't thank you enough for sharing your experience... especially how critical scale is.

 

Sigh... that is a lot of drilling, but... with a few sharp bits it will go very fast. Now I just have to make sure I can get about 1,500-2,000 more of these rivets!

[Hubac's Historian]

I thought it might interest you to take a look at the brilliant Andre Kudin’s video series for his Fleuron, 1729.  In this installment he is making the lid lanyard grommets.  His process for doing this on a wooden model isn’t as important as what the finished grommet looks like.  Granted, there is a good 50+ years between Fleuron and SR, but there is some insight to be gleaned.

 

You can turn on English subtitles in his videos to understand what he is saying.  Andre is an extremely resourceful modeler, and his Fleuron is a true gem of the craft:

 

 

Edited February 9 by Hubac's Historian

[EricWiberg]

Marc, this video is very helpful (I also looked at some of his other videos... jaw dropping!). My main takeaway is that I was on the right track by using blackened brass tubes in the lanyard hole. His lanyard holes pierce the wales as needed....

 

Another main takeaway is that as much as I am enamored of the leather waterproof shield/tube system that I created ala HMS Victory... I don't see them on Fleuron (50 years after Soleil Royal), nor on any VDV drawings. Sooo... I think it is accurate to just have the blackened tubes in the lanyard holes. There are many other takeaways as well!

 

Also, I finished bolting all of the scarf joints on the port side. The hard part is simply drilling the holes (it's not hard... just going to be a lot of holes!). Inserting the rivets is very easy. I am 75% of the way through my initial order of 350 rivets... as soon as I saw that they worked, I ordered 23 more packets (4,025 rivets), so I think I will be set.

[EricWiberg]

Since I have to wait several weeks for 4,025 0.03" round head rivets to arrive, I might as well drill all of the holes for bolting the wales.

 

I had no desire to drill the holes freehand, so I experimented making several different types of hole patterns/spacing in Word (after examining what Hubac's Historian and Michael Saunier did on their creations). I settled on a pattern that I liked and cut a narrow paper template out, and affixed it to the wale by a little Elmer's glue (I tested the pattern first on the old hull). After 30 minutes of drying, I simply drilled a smalll hole at every black dot. Then I washed the paper template/Elmer's glue away and went back to every hole to drill it through the plastic hull. It's fast and very easy for me.... I should be done in  a few days with a long wait for rivets.

 

 

 

[EricWiberg]

Both hulls now have all of the holes drilled for the wale bolts (plastic rivets). I noticed that a few of the rivets that I had applied yesterday had fallen out. I had been putting the end of each 0.03" rivet shaft into a blob of Revell contact cement, and then inserting into the hole. I switched to Loctite Super Glue Gel; the Gel is viscous enough that a small blob is apparent on the end of the rivet, and sort of spreads out under the rivet head as the rivet is inserted (whereas the Revell cement was thinnly spread out on the shaft).

 

Now I am wrestling with scuppers, of all things. I have seen wonderful models and period pictures with scupper boxes that just protrude out over a wale. Then there are other period models/drawings with a simple hole in the side of the hull! I may just go with small box scuppers to add a bit of visual interest so someone thinks "what is that thing?". Also waiting in the bullpen are the revised ladder steps for the hull.

[Hubac's Historian]

Eric, can you please remind me where you purchased these rivets from?  They look like the ideal fastener for my chain preventer plate links.

[popeye2sea]

I second that,  I will be needing them for the same application.

 

Henry

[EricWiberg]

Marc/Henry... I got them at Eugene Toy and Hobby... I searched and searched all over the 'net and found them. If you type in "rivets" in the search box, their various sizes and types come up. I have ordered 5 packs from them and they have been very prompt, but I need 20+ packs now, so I emailed them and they have contacted the supplier for an extra large order... they have been great to work with.

 

https://www.eugenetoyandhobby.com/pages/have-questions-get-in-touch

 

I finished the port side ladders today. I have settled on having TWO ropes, one on each side, so I will install some eyes in the hull after painting.

 

 

 

Edited February 15 by EricWiberg

[Hubac's Historian]

Thanks for the reference, Eric!  This is all shaping up very nicely.

[EricWiberg]

Finally worked on the scuppers after much internal debate. After looking at lots of build logs and the finished models and any historical references to scuppers that I could find.... I placed three scuppers on the lower gun deck and then five on the next gun deck above. I will certainly add 5-6 scuppers on the weather deck as well. I decided to make "boxes", if only for visual interest, instead of just tubes for the scupper exits.

 

I was using the St. Phillipe monograph for scupper dimensions and placement, but then it just seemed to make sense to only have several scuppers on the lower gun deck (as I have also seen on some builds). After painting, I will affix blackened/grayed metal rings on the scupper exits, as believe the scupper tubes were lined with lead. If you had asked me two months ago before I started this build... "would you ever spend 45 minutes using an X-acto knife to make a tiny slot in a tiny piece of plastic..?", I would have laughed at you.

[EricWiberg]

Wow! Almost two months since my last post. I was away the month of March, but was also waiting for my final supplies of rivets (the company was bought out and there was a transition with no parts available!). However, as I cooled my heels, I was able to do a lot of reading and review a lot of build logs. Since I am committed to building an SR 1671, I have been particularily focused on what GuyM has written, as well as Hubac's Historian. The wale rivets are essentially done... the St. Phillipe monograph seems to show that the bottom two wales are more robustly fastened to the hull... so I used "0.042 rivets in the bottom wales, and much finer "0.032 rivets in the upper wales (they also transitioned from a dark grey color to a white color for the rivets... won't matter when it is cleaned and painted). 

 

The last few days have been dedicated  to the port QG. I opened up the galleries on both levels, and fiddled with opening up the scroll work. Then I cleaned the "carvings" from the panels up for later attachment to the hull inside the QG... it has been quite helpful to see what GuyM has been doing (some final fine cleaning with a needle file is required).

 

I also ground out the the two bottom wales and carved new wales to start from the scarf joints and finish aft. It was fairly straightforward, but I have wasted a lot of time fiddling to achieve a "perfect sweep" up... the new wales are about 2mm higher as they rise. I have officially given up on trying to make a perfect sweep... the QG will cover a part of the wales, and the white of the wales contrasts starkly with the hull and makes any imperfection seem the size of Mt Everest. Oh... also carved out the extra gunport on the middle deck that will be in the QG!

 

Next is to finish the QG decorations and such... after that I can drill the gun port lanyard holes, and... I am actually ready to prime and see what I have!